Linus Hsu

Linus Hsu - Class of 2018

When I was four years old, my family moved from Hsinchu, Taiwan to Massachusetts. The change wasn’t as drastic as you’d think it would be. I settled into American life pretty well, picking up basic English in a month or so (according to my parents my first full sentence in English came from me yelling at other kids to give me a turn on the slide, preschool elitists smh). I had to start going by the English name I had picked out during daycare, Linus, because apparently Yuan-Ting is too hard to pronounce. And then they had the audacity to judge me when I didn’t say Hermione correctly on my first try. Like boi, you taught us to sound out long words your way, when you sound out Hermione you break it into Her-mi-one like any logical person would do because it’s the most even syllable spread, of course people are going to say it wrong, JK Rowling. Anyway, I chose Linus because I liked the character from Peanuts. He would suck his thumb and carry around a nice blue blanket everywhere, and had all these idioms he would preach at people randomly. Sounds just like me amirite? Plus, it’s not a common name, and people tend to remember it better than Tim. Tim is what my parents were going to name me. Timothy Hsu. Glad I got out of that one. Anyway, after living in the Residence Inn in Danvers for 3 months and finishing up preschool, my family moved to our first real home in America: a little townhouse in Beverly where I did kindergarten and first grade, then hopped over to Andover, where I completed second, third, and fourth grade. In fifth grade, we moved again to Ipswich, and that’s where I’ve been since.

Stephanie Veerman

Stephanie Veerman - Class of 2018

I've always been really enthusiastic and outgoing, but last year I got diagnosed with anxiety and panic disorder. All of the things that I used to love to do like singing and acting, especially in front of people, I would panic when I went out to do it. This was really different for me and I went into depression about it because this was always something I wanted. Acting was my escape. In college I wanted to be a theater major and my dream was to eventually be on Broadway. I went to New York this summer to see a Broadway show and I just didn't like it. I was really panicked the whole time and it was really weird for me because I didn't want that for myself anymore. This year it's been really interesting because I've been dealing with how to balance that I'm changing. It's been kind of sad but it's also been really eye-opening because I've always heard that people changed, but I never thought I would change everything, what I want to do in life, and my whole entire personality. I'm still happy and outgoing but I now want to go into the medical field and help people like this. I want to go into phycology and really study why this happens. Everything happens for a reason and I think this happened to because I can help other people with it, too.

Pat Gillis

Pat Gillis - Class of 2018

I was born on leap year. It happens every four years. February 29th is the date, and actually when I was 8 years old I was on the front of the Ipswich Chronicle for being born on leap year because actually only 1 in 29 people in America are born on leap year. That's a true fact. I face a lot of oppression for being born on leap year, you know, like when I went to get my permit they actually wouldn't let me get it because I'm not actually 16. So I protested outside the RMV. But other than that, it gets me a lot of sympathy from places. I can still go on kiddie rides if I want to; the ones that are still fun but they don't let you on. But then I'm also 6 feet tall so I can go on the big kid ones, too. Other than that, being 4 is pretty savage because I get birthday cards that you give to toddlers but they just write my name on them like, "Happy 4th Birthday!" and people will add like a .5 to the end of it or something depending on when I was born. But yeah, it's lit!